Surrender
by Anne Bowman
Summary: Molly hits some new lows, and someone is there to help her... but will he make her life better, or worse? (Eventually: Molly/Carey, so stay away if that bugs you. R for language and adult themes.)
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: First off, this is my first fanfic ever. And guess what? I don't own anybody or anything in this world, including the characters alluded to herein, and I doubt their original creators would appreciate what I've done to them, either. I'm sorry!  
  
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Penetration is always the hardest part. When you're looking down at something that is one way and you know you have the choice to change it into something different and new, it's easy to feel afraid of change and put your intentions away. And it is a commitment.   
  
The hardest part of the whole thing is always sitting there with the tip of the blade poised, scratching your skin. That's the most crucial turning point, because you haven't committed yet. Then you do commit, because you must, because you want to, because you enjoy it, because you have the power and no one else can make this decision for you. So you do it. You penetrate. At first it's scary because nothing happens.   
  
Your first idea is, maybe I should push it a little further, MAKE something happen. That's not necessary and is in fact a bit dangerous because once you get started it's hard to stop. If you're patient and you wait, you'll get what you want. First nothing for what seems like forever, then it rushes like a flood, almost. Then the decision is whether to push it further forward and make a longer line, or to withdraw and start again. And the decision is yours.  
  
At this point you may be shaking your head and wondering what kind of idiot would actually do this. I know a lot of people just like you, who wouldn't understand. But to me it's a hobby, like stamp collecting or baseball cards. Instead of wax packs, I collect scars. You don't get any gum, but it's a hell of a rush. I started when I was younger, a teenager already accustomed to pain and anger and loss. Burned on the outside, raw in the middle. I stopped when things started getting serious with Rick. I thought I didn't need it anymore. And I didn't; I had him to think about, to take care of, to be taken care of by.   
  
When he died I briefly entertained the idea of starting again one night when Irene had taken the kids out to give me the evening off. I had the knife ready, but I couldn't do it. It was a sign of weakness, I felt. It was crazy. I had the kids to think about, to take care of, to be taken care of by.   
  
So why now? Because again I find myself alone and the person I was hasn't changed. I've only gotten more angry, more bitter, more injured. I am a magnet for loss. First Rick, then Fiona, now Jack has become so mature and self-sufficient that I'm not necessary in his life anymore, just an accessory of his semi-normal existence. So the night I found out about the unit that was "Jack and Annie" I knew exactly where to turn. Some things just don't change. 


	2. Chapter 2

It had been exactly seven days since I picked up the old habit when I was found out. A lesson I learned early on was to avoid getting discovered at all costs. I've read about people who do it just to get noticed, attention-seekers whose thrill comes with the concern from others that results when their secret is revealed. I am not one of those people. My thrill comes from just *doing* it, from doing it just because I can, from the actual anticipatory moment between the penetration and the flood.   
  
I learned early on that there are people who will sympathize with you and shower you with the attention they think you want, and then there are people who will commit you to a mental institution to have the craziness shocked out of you. So over the years I have cultivated a nice collection of long-sleeved shirts. (Some people like to carve their stomachs. For me this is getting a little too close to valuable organs. Or maybe I've just seen too many slasher movies where someone gets disemboweled and their fake guts fall out. It's gross and dangerous. Arms are safe. Legs are okay in theory, but not as satisfying, because you can't be constantly feeling them and sneaking looks at them when they're covered up.)   
  
I was alone for the evening. My instinct was to forbid the in-house Jack and Annie relationship, but it would be of no use; they could just sneak around behind my back or at school, and the idea that it was taboo would just give them an added incentive to continue the relationship, whereas if I just let it progress naturally, they would probably split up within the next month or two. High school relationships, though quite involving at the time, don't last forever. So I had given them my implied blessing (with the stipulation that there was to be no sneaking from bedroom to bedroom in the middle of the night) and this particular evening they had gone out on their first real non-secret date.   
  
Frankly, I was glad for the break. Annie's a nice girl, but she doesn't really fit in here, with her bright colors and sweet temper. And the only advantage to the idea of Fi being gone was that maybe our lives would finally settle back down without someone constantly seeking out and being sought out by the paranormal, but Annie's almost as bad, and this year has been difficult. 


	3. Chapter 3

The thing is, he wasn't supposed to be there. I locked my door. Jack and Annie wouldn't wake me up if they knew what was good for them; a makeout session could be ended pretty quickly if one of them made the mistake of knocking on my door just to tell me they were home. It was by accident. (Is anything in this life an accident?) I read a book until my eyes started burning, so I tried to sleep. I did. But my delirious mind wouldn't stop racing, babbling on and on and on. After an hour or so of this madness, I felt that old familiar pull in my stomach, that little "so you could do it now if you wanted" temptation whispering in my ear.   
  
So, I did. Just a little. Just pulled my sleeve up and made one simple little mark. And then another. And then another. And so forth, and so on. After I felt calmed down enough, I went in and took a sleeping pill. Just one. Just enough to ease my mind and make it easier to rest. I didn't bother to clean it up; who would be around to notice or care but me?   
  
And then it happened. 5 minutes after midnight, the pounding. I could hear it, but I convinced myself it was part of the disjointed dream I was having about monkeys and swords and being involved in some sort of jungle war, humans vs. animals. We were winning, or at least I was, I think. The pounding...   
  
I guess it must have been a frightening sight. There I was sprawled out on the bed, dead to the world, with one bloody arm stretched out, little drops of it on the sheet, and the knife near where my other hand was so carelessly strewn. I didn't see his expression when he succeeded in shoving the door open, but I imagine it must have been unlike any other I've ever seen on his face. Then the shaking. Dear God, it went on forever. He was shouting, too, shouting my name over and over. When I first got my eyes open I thought it was Jack, and then it occurred to me that he wouldn't be shouting my name, he'd be shouting "Mom," or something of that nature. So you'll excuse me for the accurate report that my first question was: "Jesus Christ, Carey, what the fuck are you doing here?" 


	4. Chapter 4

I've never been the kind of girl who finds the tied-to-the-railroad-tracks Dudley Do-Right fantasy appealing, so unfortunately his look of concern was far more irritating than endearing. He just gaped. I squinted at him, still in a Unisom haze, and repeated myself. "I said, what are you doing here? It's... I don't know what time it is, but it's really late." I pulled the sleeves of my pajama top over the palms of my hands and stared him down. "No, I haven't been attacked by some crazy arm-stabber, and it's not anything like it looks. So unless it's a matter of life and death, would you mind restricting your visits to normal business hours?"  
  
I could see the exact moment when the little wheel in his brain started running again. "I thought it *was* a matter of life and death, obviously, or I wouldn't have pounded and yelled and unlocked the door without a key."   
  
"Whose life? Whose death?"  
  
"I called Jack a couple of hours ago. He said he'd get back to me in a few minutes and I never heard from him again."  
  
"That's probably because he and Annie are out on a date."  
  
"A date?"  
  
As if he were a young child, or an imbecile, or partially deaf: "Yes. A date."  
  
"So that explains..."  
  
"Where she was, too."  
  
"And then your door was locked, and they were gone, and it was... well, you can't blame me, can you? All the weird shit that goes on around here. For all I knew, you were all in here hanging from the ceiling fan."  
  
"Okay, so, now that it's been established that Jack and Annie haven't been hung from anything tonight, at least not in this house, and certainly not in this room, do you think you could come back later?"  
  
Instead of simply smiling goofily in his usual manner and maybe apologizing for the door thing and the panic and leaving, like I'd hoped, he sat down on the bed instead. _And it's gonna be another long one tonight... _  
  
"Tell me what it is if it isn't what it looks like."  
  
"It's just a thing, a thing I do. I don't expect you to understand, but I do expect a little discretion on your part after I assure you that it isn't driven by any real desire to harm myself and certainly not the desire to harm other people."  
  
"So what is it driven by?"  
  
"I don't think I have to explain myself to you, Carey." I regarded him sourly. In hindsight, perhaps I should have treated him more kindly. He was concerned, and concern can be sweet.  
  
"No, you don't have to." But he didn't make a move to leave, like I had expected. By this time maybe I should have started getting accustomed to the idea that what I expected of him would almost always be a mistaken impression. He just sat there, staring at me, and it created an uncomfortable tension. I looked all around the room, at the fan, the desk, the door, the closet. Anything to keep from meeting that stare.  
  
"Nothing ever turned out like I planned," I finally said. "Even before I started making real plans, life had no intention of treating me kindly. When I was about Fi's age, it was a way to calm myself down whenever events conspired to build up my inner rage, or whatever. Ignored at home, deserted by friends, mistreated, underestimated. It was personal and harmless then and it's personal and harmless now."  
  
"I don't think it's harmless."  
  
"Then you clearly don't understand."  
  
"No, I don't. I think it is harmful on a psychological level, and you should stop, because there are a lot of people around here who care about you and would be very upset if they found out about this, and I'm one of them. I think that whyever it is that you're doing it now, you should get that out of your life."  
  
"It's not things _in _my life that make it so attractive these days. It's the things that have left my life and won't be coming back, or won't be coming back in the same way. But I... you know, I never would have burdened you with this. This is my own thing to carry around, not anyone else's, and I don't enjoy talking about it. So please keep this between you and me, and maybe I will try to get back on the straight and narrow soon," I promised insincerely, flashing a joyless smile. "And it is late, so do you think now that we've discussed this and you know everything's okay with Jack..."  
  
"Yeah, I'll pack it in. I'm sorry about waking you up." And there it was, that trademark smile I'd expected, only it was a little wearier, as much of an empty gesture as my own. He headed for the door and closed it quietly behind him.   
  
"Finally." I flopped back onto the bed and made an unpleasant face when I remembered the knife was still lying there, somewhere underneath me now. I pulled myself up again and looked around in the sheets until I found it. I was headed for the bathroom to rinse it off when the door swung open again. "Hey, I'm sorry, I just wanted to let you know, in case you were concerned, that Jack and Annie are outside in the car making out, I saw them as I was..."   
  
I started and froze in position for a second, annoyed by the second intrusion, although the news was a bit comforting. He dove at me, knocking the knife across the floor, which is where we also landed. Seriously pissed off now, I fought and slapped at him. He loosened his grip on the offending wrist and gave me a look so heartbreaking I could have cried. It was the look of a wounded puppy who doesn't understand why its adored master persists in whacking it on the nose with a newspaper.  
  
For the second time in one evening, my question was: "What the fuck are you doing?"  
  
"What the fuck are _you _doing? I thought I'd actually gotten it through to you that you shouldn't do that because everyone here loves you and--"  
  
"And I thought I might have gotten it through to you that it's not about being 'loved' and that's beside the point anyway because I _wasn't doing anything_, which isn't your business to begin with--"  
  
"How can it be beside the point? How can it be anything _but _the point?" The argument of a child, really; an innocent. Yet I ceased the struggle and softened my own expression. And despite the warning alarms in my head increasing their own volume exponentially, I decided not to defend the temple when the intimacy of the moment overcame him and he kissed me.  
  
_Fast slow, fast fast slow._


	5. Chapter 5

Author's note, disclaimer, etc: Chapter 5 and still I haven't succeeded in my plan to take over the world (or at least the Disney channel) and therefore own the rights to these characters. Damn. Also, thanks for the reviews! :) 

So things were great. For a month, things were really great. Around the others it was still "Sorry I drank out of the milk carton, Mrs. P.," and "Oh, those wacky teenagers and their shenanigans." Still, no matter how much deeper our relationship became during the quiet moments when the others left us alone (and no, you perverts, I'm not just talking about the physical element), there was a sense of impending doom that infected every word, every glance, every touch. I think we both knew, or at least I did, that one of us would eventually come up with the brilliant idea of telling them all for the sake of being open and not lying to everyone else we loved, and that one idea would bring this all crashing down around us.   
  
At just under the one-month mark, the suggestion finally attacked. It was a perfectly peaceful... I don't know, what do you call the hours between midnight and dawn? We were just lying in bed, not touching, fully clothed. I could feel his warmth occupying the left half of the mattress, hear him blinking in the darkness, and it was perfect. And then: "I want to tell them." As if the idea had already been introduced and argued about, and he was returning to the subject after everyone had a chance to calm down. Just, "I want to tell them."  
  
"I think that's an extraordinarily bad idea," I said after a long, long silence.   
  
"I know."  
  
"Why do you think it isn't?"  
  
"Because what happens if they just find out?"  
  
"That won't happen."  
  
"You can't hide from it forever, you know. I know it's working now, and it _is _working, it's working great, but what happens after a year, three years, five?"  
  
"Good lord, you're optimistic." Another long silence. "I'm sorry. I just don't know if it's... worth it, I mean, what happens if this doesn't last? Maybe the only thing keeping us together is the fact that we shouldn't be together."  
  
"You think that's all it is?"  
  
I sat up and faced him. "What happens the first time I slip? What happens the first time I go back to treating you like one of Jack's friends? What happens the first time I talk to you like your mother?"  
  
"That won't happen."  
  
It was my turn to stare him down. "Look, I'm fucked up. I'm your mother's best friend. I'm obnoxious when I don't get what I want, and sometimes I'm obnoxious when I do get what I want because often I don't deserve it. I was lonely without you and I'll probably be lonely with you. Nothing lasts forever. I'd give this another month. Maybe. If we tell anyone at all, both of our worlds will be crushed in an instant. Your mother and father will despise me. They'll call you things you should never have to hear from your own parents. My children will despise and resent both of us. Everyone we know will be against this. You need to think about whether you want this--me--enough to risk that." I swallowed hard and softened my voice to imply sincerity. "And if you decide that this isn't worth it, I'm not going to blame you. Things can just go back to the way they were."  
  
"Do you really think that could ever happen, that things could just go back to the way they were?"  
  
I didn't answer. I just looked at him, silently daring him to walk out the door. Instead he spoke, barely audible: "You know what I feel, Molly. What do _you _want?"  
  
Wasn't it obvious from the way I had so generously offered him an out instead of demanding that he go?   
  
I was forming a more coherent answer than my instincts had initially provided when he attacked again with this: "Do you love me?"  
  
Again, silence. What the hell was I supposed to say? (Yes. I was supposed to say yes.) But I didn't. I offered something safer: "I... I just... I don't know what to..."  
  
And he met my silent challenge by getting up and walking out the door. Just as I'd planned.  
  
_You got what you want, now you can hardly stand it, though..._


	6. Chapter 6

_left alone in desert  
this house becomes a hell  
this love becomes a tether  
this room becomes a cell_

I have never been good at apologies. But after at least a week of roaming around the house desolately, barely speaking to Jack and Annie, who were bound to start getting suspicious soon if they hadn't already, it was clear that I had no choice in the matter. I was barely civil to those unfortunate enough to attempt to initiate a conversation with me, and when they left me to my own devices I just wandered the halls and the roads near the house at all hours. 

_how long must I suffer?  
dear god, I've served my time  
this love becomes my torture  
this love, my only crime_

I tried to justify it to myself, over and over, until even I got tired of hearing, "Well, it really wasn't fair of him to put me on the spot like that. And he's only a child. And how can he expect me to give up everyone else just for this?"   
  
So at 3 in the morning I finally picked up the phone. Ned and Irene had gone to Denver for the weekend. It was safe. He should have been there. No answer. 

_lover please release me  
my arms too weak to grip  
my eyes too dry for weeping  
my lips too dry to kiss_

First: Fuck this. I'm not dependent. I'm the one who's used to being left alone, remember? I drove him away because I needed to find out if he'd go. It was a test, and he failed. (Or was it me?) If he was in love, he would have stayed. It's fine. I'm tired of feeling like there's some connection between us that's been broken, so now there's something missing inside me. There isn't. I'm the same as I was before that night. Nothing lost, nothing gained. 

_Calling Jesus, please  
Send his love to me  
I'm begging Jesus, please  
Send his love to me_

Then: Where the hell is he? It's 3 in the morning. Is something wrong? Or has he returned to swimming in the bottomless sea of guitar-player groupies? Why would that bother me? Why should I care? It was just something we did for a while. No one ever has to know. Maybe this searing physical tension, this unholy blend of fear and adrenaline and anger and sadness, that I'm feeling is just a symptom of some illness. Maybe I'm coming down with something. Maybe it's menopause.   
  
And so I was back to where I started. I knew I would torture myself all night with this train of thought charging forth at full speed if I didn't take something for it now. Oddly, I hadn't felt the urge to collect any new scars since that first night. Not even after he left. While he was here, I was too intent on not doing it to really be tempted, and since he'd been gone, I had been too apathetic. I did feel emptier now...  
  
I had taken the pill at least an hour ago, and it hadn't done any good at all. I was calmer, but still physically wired. So I headed out for yet another late-night walk around the house, slipping on some sneakers and wrapping myself in a robe. And there it was. He's sitting in his car, in the driveway, wide awake, with the engine off. I walked over and he just stared at me silently through the window, with the expression of a moth who's been burned by the light before. (Do moths ever get burned? I don't know. It's just what I remember thinking he looked like.) I tried to open the driver's door, but it was locked. It was time.  
  
I tried to enhance the compassion in my voice. "I'm sorry."  
  
Muffled through the glass, but still vitriolic: "For what, for not feeling what I thought you did? For not feeling what I did?"  
  
"I never said I didn't--"  
  
"You didn't need to say it."  
  
"Yes, I did. You should have bothered to listen instead of jumping to your own conclusion."  
  
"Maybe I was just as scared as you are."  
  
"I'm not--"  
  
"You are."  
  
"You're very presumptuous," I noted with a hint of genuine irritation. "Why don't you get out of the car so we can have a normal conversation?"  
  
"Why don't you get in the car so we can have a normal conversation without freezing to death?"   
  
"You never give an inch, do you?"  
  
I walked around to the unlocked passenger side. It was just as cold in the car as it had been outside, only instead of the smell of recent smoke and fire, there was the smell of recently-cleaned leather. I wanted to get out again as soon as the door clicked shut. We sat there quietly for a minute or two.  
  
"So why did you come here? Were you going to come in?"  
  
"I wanted an answer. I wanted a real answer so that I would have a reason to hate you, because I knew what the answer would be."  
  
"No, you didn't."  
  
Quiet filled the space so aggressively until I couldn't be sure I had said what I did. There was a faint trace of my recent voice in the air, and then it simply disappeared. Maybe I hadn't spoken at all.  
  
"Then I think we should tell them."  
  
"It's just--"  
  
"Because I'm going insane. Every time my mother calls my name I fear she's found out. Every time I get a letter in the mail I'm afraid it's from you, even though I'd love it if it were. Every time I get a phone call I'm thinking, what if it's her? What if they figure it out? It's not that I'm afraid of _you_. I'm afraid of what will happen when they put two and two together. And I shouldn't be afraid of them. I'm an adult, I can make my own decisions, and as much as I love my parents, they're just going to have to handle it. So I _need _to tell them. And I need you to be okay with that."  
  
"How can I be okay with losing everyone else in my life? It won't just be them. It'll be Jack and Fi, too, my best friends and my own children."  
  
"This is the hard part, right now. But the sooner we get through it, the sooner everyone can have a chance to start dealing with it and being okay with it."  
  
"This is the kind of thing someone could stay angry about for the rest of their lives. The odds of anyone ever being okay with this are horrible."  
  
"So you think we should just stop this and return to our separate corners and never speak of it again?"  
  
"I think you don't know what you're getting into."  
  
"I came back. You gave me your answer."  
  
"Things will never be the same."  
  
"You said nothing lasts forever, anyway. What if we die tomorrow?"  
  
I leaned over and kissed him chastely. "We just might."   
  
I got out of the car and walked toward the house, leaving the front door open behind me. I heard the driver's door squeak open and click closed.


	7. Chapter 7

There's something simultaneously scary and thrilling about keeping a secret. Scary, because you know what you know would have irreversible effects on certain people if they discovered what you were hiding, but thrilling, because you have the power to withhold or divulge information that could change the course of the lives of certain people completely--including your own.  
  
Then the paranoia sets in. Every phone call is someone ratting you out. Every sideways glance people share is about what you think they don't know. Then it becomes almost physically impossible to keep your lips and your tongue and your vocal cords from acting independently of your head and robbing yourself of that heady power. Every time you see the person or people from whom your secret is kept, you find yourself speaking extra slowly to keep from letting anything accidentally slip out, until they become convinced you have gone mental and start avoiding you altogether.   
  
I can handle keeping secrets. It's my forte. But he just couldn't live with it, and there _is_ something exciting about being on the verge of changing your life and the lives of everyone around you with a few little words, so I decided to let this happen. We made a battle plan: first Ned and Irene, then Jack, Fi, Clu, and Annie.   
  
It never occurred to me that we had left someone out.  
  
I became aware of his displeasure with our connection the morning after our decision to tell the secret. Carey had gone out early as usual, so as not to be noticed by the other members of the household; the sun wasn't yet up, and I was somewhere between awake and asleep when it happened. My entire hand suddenly seemed to be on fire. The sensation jarred me awake and I stared at the offending hand in horror until I realized that my hand was cold to the touch and it was the ring that was causing my discomfort. The Celtic thumb ring seemed to be angry, glowing furiously. My instinct was to yank it off and throw it across the room or out the window, but when I made the move to do exactly that, I only ended up with burned fingers and the conviction that the ring was stuck. Ugh. The pain was starting to dull, anyway. I was ready to go right back to sleep when I finally figured out what was going on.   
  
"Oh, fuck off," I whispered, so as not to risk waking anyone. Wherever he was, I knew he was listening hard enough to hear. "You have no right to object to anything, so just stop it. You know what I finally figured out? I wasted all those years feeling sad and sorry for myself that you had been taken from us. But you weren't _taken_ from us. You _left_. Everything you ever should have wanted was right here. I was right here. We just weren't enough for you. It was your choice to leave that night when any sane man would have stayed. So I loved you, and I know you loved me, and I'm sorry about what happened, but you don't have any right to stand in the way of the rest of my life anymore."   
  
The pain grew more intense for a moment, and then faded slowly. I took off the ring for a second, and drew back my hand with the intention of pitching it as I'd first been inclined to do, but thought better of it and slipped it back on my finger. I could talk the talk, but I wasn't ready to completely forsake the past for the future just yet.  
  
Our argument had fully awakened me, though, and with this much angry adrenaline pumping through my veins there would be no more sleep this night. Instead I padded down the hall into Jack's room and weaved a precarious path through the clutter on the floor. I sat down on the end of the bed and took a long last look at a son who believed in his mother. I could have cried, just thinking of how he would never look at me the same way again after he found out. When I hadn't registered any particular objection to his relationship with Annie, she had squealed "Wicked!" and thrown her arms around me and practically started calling me mom on the spot. I wondered if he had worried about my reaction to that revelation the same way I was so worried about his now. 

I knew him well enough to know what it would be: intense anger, disbelief, resentment. And that would all give way, eventually, to a grudging acceptance. But things would never, ever be the same. Not even if I ended my attachment to Carey within five minutes of telling him about it. It would be the very fact that I hadn't been honest with him from the beginning, not to mention the unalterable fact that Carey had been a part of our family for so long that saying it now, "our relationship," felt strangely Oedipal and morally outrageous. Of course, that didn't change who we were apart from the other people in our lives, or how we related as individual adults--because he was an adult, and I didn't initiate this, I pointed out to... well, no one. Just practicing, I guess.  
  
In a strange way it felt like I was saying goodbye to Jack, like one of us was about to die. I guess death is something we live with our whole lives until that final moment. The past dies with every new morning; potential dies with every wasted second. A relationship dies and a new one springs up in its place.   
  
Maybe in order to really live, you have to let yourself die a little every day...


	8. Chapter 8

She took it just about as terribly as I thought she would. I had valiantly attempted to alter my consciousness in some way before we made the announcement to Ned and Irene, but he wouldn't hear of it. Which was cute, in a way, but also not. So here we were, sitting on the couch in their living room, having shifted positions from being knee to knee to pressed against the extreme ends of the couch. Irene was standing, droning on in the same angry tone she'd been using for about half an hour now. Ned had left the room after quickly registering his outrage and objection to our revelation.   
  
We had figured, or I had, that Ned wouldn't really be that upset; shocked, at first, but not in the disowning/killing mood. Finally, Irene stopped sputtering and said, "Carey, go talk to your father in the kitchen. I need to speak to Molly privately now." Without so much as a glance in my direction, he fled the room with his head lowered. I almost smiled.  
  
Then she turned on me. "What the fuck, Molly?"  
  
"I... it's not like we entered into this with the specific intention of hurting you. It wasn't until later that I started weighing the consequences. And eventually we came to the conclusion that it was worth this."  
  
"'It'?" she laughed mirthlessly.   
  
"You know, us." I fidgeted, still uncomfortable with that idea, using that term to describe whatever it was that Carey and I had at the moment.

She just stared at me and paced around the room for a moment. Then she seemed to calm down and sat in the position her son had recently vacated. "Look, I think it's great that you're finally in a position to move on. It's been nearly fifteen years. But Jesus Christ, what the hell are you doing?"  
  
"I'm not the--" I tried to interject defensively, but she wasn't having it.  
  
"If it were any other kid, I would be supportive, you know? But it isn't just some kid. It's my kid, who you've known since birth. You've watched him grow up playing with your own kids. How can you do this?"  
  
"I... I just..."  
  
"It's completely perverted and disgusting to even think of what has gone on between you. You're not just victimizing him here, either. How can you do this to _me_? After everything Ned and I have done for--"  
  
Angry, now: "Wait, wait, wait. Victimizing? What am I, some kind of... well, I don't know. But I'm still the same person, Irene. I haven't changed. This wasn't planned. It just happened. It wasn't my idea. But I'm glad that it did happen. And if you--if... I don't want to ask you to accept it, because if it was something similar with Jack and somebody I know I never could. I guess I... I don't know."  
  
She sighed and avoided my stare for a minute, then spoke up a little hesitantly, a new strategy clearly dawning. "Look, no offense, Molly, but you're... you're kind of... damaged, you know? Carey's just a kid. He deserves some fresh-faced college girl with ambitions and hopes and dreams and the whole first love experience, not a woman old enough to be his mother who's also, you know... somewhat fucked up. Isn't that what you want for Jack?" She threw an innocent, searching gaze at me.  
  
Fuck. Irene should have been a lawyer. She's the best debater I've ever seen. She knows how to keep punching until she's got you in a corner and on the defense, and then she knows how to go straight for the kill. And I'm down for the count.  
  
She continued, pragmatically: "I don't want to forbid him from seeing you anymore, or you from seeing him, because then you can't work together, and you do work well together musically. So I think it should be you who ends it. Because, really, isn't that the only thing you can do? Just acknowledge that it was a brief sex thing, you've had your fun playing Mrs. Robinson, and both of you can move forward."  
  
"It wasn't, though," I whispered.  
  
"Wasn't what?"   
  
"Just a sex thing."   
  
"What are you calling it, then?" she asked, her voice hardening. Clearly it was time to start catching the fly with vinegar instead of honey.  
  
"It's much more serious than that."  
  
"What, you think it's love?" Another scary angry chuckle. "Good Lord, Molly, I really would expect more of you."  
  
The fidgeting was fast and furious now. I had nearly rubbed a hole in my sleeve with the itchy desire to get control of something, anything. "I... I'll leave. You're right." She wasn't, but I had to get out of there. I would have said anything just to get out of the ring before another verbal death blow. I got up and started backing toward the door. "I'm sorry. You're right. It was just a thing, something we did. I'm sorry. We should never even have told you about it. It was really inconsequential. I'm... I'm going to leave now. I'm sorry."   
  
She just smiled at me with the glow of success illuminating her bared teeth. "It's okay, it's okay. Everyone has their moment of weakness. I understand. I'll have a talk with him and everything will go back to normal."   
  
"Okay." Finally outside, I broke into a run for the car, slamming the door behind me. I heard it bang open again as I pulled the car door closed and started the engine.   
  
"Don't do it, Molly." His shouted words echoed through the darkness. I accelerated to drown them out and left him there, shrinking in the rearview mirror.


	9. Chapter 9

I was dizzy with the power that was in my hands now. One turn of the wheel and I could end all of this confusion and resentment and anger and fear. I imagined the car slamming into the base of a tree, my head cracking the windshield, just lying there letting the blood drain until there was nothing left worth saving. Or maybe we could dive off a bridge, falling until that great impact, then sleep and then nothing. Or I could just go home, say goodbye to the kids, and mean it. So many choices. Drinking, pills, poison, or something more gruesome. Not too gruesome, though. It would have to look at least somewhat like an accident. I wouldn't want the kids to be too traumatized.   
  
There was clearly nothing left for me at all. My relationship with Ned and Irene would be forever changed even if I did allow them to end the thing with Carey; I had already destroyed what we had by letting Irene think she had succeeded in knocking some sense into me. What would he think when she told him how I backed down, how I just ran away at the first sign of defeat? That was over. Jack didn't need me anymore; Fi had a new life that didn't include us, anyway. There was nothing left except this last moment of absolute control over my own life.   
  
I accelerated more, feeling more reckless than I had since my teenage years. I had never been a fresh-faced college girl with sweet ambitions and hopes and dreams and fantasies of meeting a husband, or whatever deranged idea Irene had of what her future daughter-in-law would be. My prime was long gone. My purpose had been served. So I decided to do it myself at home. It would be less "accidental," but more comfortable.   
  
Jack was studying in his room when I arrived, breathless and rosy from the cold. I asked what he was doing, how he was, told him good night, and closed the door behind me. Annie was already asleep. I felt no real obligation to her, not being her mother, so I simply smiled at her sleeping form and closed her door quietly. Then I retreated to my room to consider the potential life-ending methods before me. But before I finished the job, I decided to re-introduce myself to my oldest friend.   
  
The scars tonight would be long and deep, all of the rage and pain that was poisoning my heart focused in that near-orgasmic moment of physical torment during initial penetration and the movement of the blade that followed. I drove it in and withdrew repeatedly, savoring the penetration each time, until I had calmed down a bit. Then I sighed with something approximating content, and cleaned it. As I carefully scrubbed the area, I began to defend myself again silently. Irene didn't know a thing about me, damn it. _After all these years, she thinks she knows me. She thinks I'm fucked up, and she has no idea just how bad it is. How bad I am.   
  
_I closed my eyes and tried again to calm down. Not a chance. I decided to go downstairs for my last meal, and headed down the hallway quietly. I noticed Jack's door was propped open again. "Goddamn it, Jack," I muttered to myself more than to him. "The only thing I told you and her not to do was..." But as I drew closer to the open door, it became apparent that the person in the room with Jack was not Annie or any other female. Feeling only slightly guilty, I decided to eavesdrop.  
  
"I know it's difficult for you to understand, or to--"  
  
"I'm not having a hard time understanding the concept. I understand it all too well. Jesus Christ, how could you?"  
  
"I know it's not the most obvious thing in the world, but it was just... right. It was an accident, almost, the way it happened, and then it was like I couldn't imagine what my life had been like, what I had been like, before. Because it doesn't matter who we've been. It's about who we are right now, in this moment. You know what I mean?"  
  
"No, I'm sorry, you lost me when you started talking about my mother like she was one of your little groupie friends. I've heard this before. Every time, it's love. Well, this isn't love, this is sick, and as far as I'm concerned, neither of you exist in my life anymore."  
  
(It was at this point I realized that this was his peace-making gesture. He was doing for me what I had done for him.)

"Oh, come on--"  
  
"What do you want me to do? Should I start calling you Dad?"  
  
"It's not like--"  
  
"We can't exactly play video games and talk about girls anymore, can we?"  
  
"I'm sorry, Jack. I'm sorry that you can't get your head around the fact that this isn't about your friend and your mother, that it's about two people who connected, it's about the chance to have something that's--"  
  
"What's going to happen when you're 40?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"When you're 40, she'll be 60. When you're 30, she'll be 50."  
  
"It isn't going to matter."  
  
Jack must have been taking scary angry chortle lessons from Irene.  
  
"I'm sorry, Jack, I am, but nobody deserves the right to stand in our way and order us to stop. Not you, not my parents, not even her. And you'll come around. It's terrible and shocking now, but it won't always be. You know what my dad said?"  
  
"Gee, no, I don't know what Grandpa said."  
  
"He just looked at me and asked if I was sure. And I said I was, and he said, 'Well, then, just give your mother some time to work it out, and you'll both be fine.'"  
  
"What a heartwarming story."  
  
"And I thought about it some more, and you know, I really am sure. And I'll be here when you decide to start thinking about the big picture. Because I love you, you know? Like I love my mother, even though right now she thinks I'm some kind of pervert. At least you both know the truth now, so we aren't lying to anyone anymore."  
  
Except maybe ourselves, I pointed out silently, and decided to return to my room as quietly as possible so as to go unnoticed.   
  
So now what? Clearly she hadn't told him what I had said, or maybe she had and he'd realized why I said it. But in a way, she was right. This would never, ever work. We were not just two people with a connection. We were Molly Phillips and her best friend's son. I could just see the headline if this ever got out. (Granted, the story would be on, like, page Z29 of the newspaper, but whatever.) "Your Grandmother's Favorite Pop Singer 'Loves' Child Barely Above Age of Consent." Well, that might be a little long to be a headline, but you get the picture. But strangely, the desire to put a stop to everything had faded. Maybe it was the things he'd said about us. As naive as I had always found his faith in us, and in me, it was oddly endearing and in this case, more than a little comforting. Even though it was obvious that this couldn't continue.   
  
I rode that thought train all night long. Still wide awake at about 3am, I finally succeeded in smothering the voice of reason. I sat down and composed three simple letters, one to Irene and Ned, one to Jack and Annie, and one to Carey himself. I left the letter for Jack outside his bedroom door. Then I got in the car, no longer imagining it to be an instrument of death, and drove to the Bells' house at the prescribed speed. Sliding the note to Irene and Ned under the front door, I wrapped Carey's around a semi-heavy rock. I tied a string I found in the glove box around it and threw it at his window. To my surprise, it actually made it through the window, which turned out to conveniently be open, without making a major commotion.   
  
I closed the car door quietly and roared out of the driveway.


	10. Chapter 10

Author's Note: This is the last chapter of this story. I still don't own the characters. The song in chapter 6 is "Send His Love To Me" by PJ Harvey; the song in this chapter is "Hey Pretty" by Poe. In both cases I took some liberties with the lyrics, deleting some and guessing at some in this chapter. Thanks for reading! :)

=======

_Well it's 3 a.m., I'm out here riding again  
through the wicked winding streets of my world  
I make a wrong turn, brake it, now I'm too far gone  
I got a siren on my tail and that ain't the fine I'm looking for  
  
_I had forgotten what a calming experience simply driving aimlessly can be. I did have a destination in mind, one that had been specified in the letters in case anyone wanted to reach me. It was time to take a break from Hope Springs, the most ironically titled town on earth. There was no hope in Hope Springs, just ruts to get stuck in. There was nothing like the peace of the highway in a small car, with only my own thoughts to keep my company. It would be difficult to keep them in line, but eventually we'd sink into the rhythm of the engine and the hum of tires on asphalt._  
_  
_I see a stairway so I follow it down into the belly of the whale   
Where my secrets echo all around  
You know me now but to do better than that, you've got to follow me  
Boy, I'm trying to show you where I'm at  
  
_Maybe my main problem was that I had always looked at myself in terms of the other people in my life. I was constantly deserted and mistreated, ignored and invisible. Well, now it was time to move forward, like Irene had suggested. It was time to push everyone away and find out who I really was without them. Songwriting had been the only way I was able to do that before; well, songwriting and my little habit, anyway. _  
_  
_Hey pretty, don't you wanna take a ride with me through my world?  
Hey pretty, don't you wanna kick and slide through my world?  
  
_By about 6 the next night, I rolled into a town of sorts, if by town you mean a collection of very small buildings and tiny crackerbox houses and one motel with a giant vacancy sign flashing desperately. _  
_  
_I got a mind full of wicked designs  
I got a nonstop hole in my head imagination  
I'm in a building that has two thousand floors and when they all fall down  
I think you know just who they're falling for  
  
_I had come to the conclusion that the era of responsible mother, sensitive friend, and supportive wife was over. I still loved my kids, Irene and Ned, and even Rick. But the person I had deserted twenty-five years ago was still alive and begging to get out. She was the one with the knife in her hand. She was the one I would no longer hide. Irene had been right. I was damaged. But who the hell isn't? Why fight it?_  
_  
_I can't forget I am the sole architect  
I built the shadows here, I built the growl in the voice I fear  
You add it up but to do better than that you've got to follow me  
Boy, I'm trying to show you where I'm at  
  
_I checked in to the motel and drove the car around to the room I was given. No other cars were in the parking lot. It was a little creepy, kind of like The Shining. This was probably exactly the kind of little town in which someone with bigger aspirations could go mad._  
_  
_Hey now, can't you feel me longing?  
(Do you get the gist of the song now?)  
Hey now, can't you feel me? Feel me now...  
  
_I took a shower and tried to sleep, but I was too wired, too enamored with my own impetuousness to calm down long enough to drift off. I tried to turn on the TV, but there was no reception. Of course. The only reading material in sight was the Bible. So I just lay still, trying to focus my thoughts on something other than my plans for the immediate future and the new personality I would adopt--or stop concealing, as it were. A color, maybe. Beige. I focused on beige. It's a stupid idea, but I read about the technique in a magazine, and it had worked before. Beige, beige, beige. The most boring color in the world. I finally found myself in the midst of one of those waking dreams where I was dreaming, but still convinced I was awake. There were these small furry aliens, but they were evil, so I was trying to kick them away, but they kept clamping on to my legs and arms and slowing me down. The aliens were about to overtake me when the pounding started. I was convinced it was coming from the mouths of the aliens themselves, but finally the noise shook me fully awake. I stayed there in bed for a moment, quietly, to see if the pounding would cease. It remained steady.   
  
I opened the door and smiled...  
  
_(Do you get the gist of the song now?)_


End file.
